1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a communication system, an information processing apparatus, a computer-readable storage medium, and a communication method, and, in particular, relates to a communication system, an information processing apparatus, a computer-readable storage medium, and a communication method, for performing a predetermined communication process between a plurality of information processing apparatuses that are communicable with each other.
2. Description of the Background Art
Conventionally, there is known a game system that allows a plurality of hand-held game apparatuses or video game apparatuses to communicate with each other. A game apparatus used in such a game system has a communication means for communicating with other game apparatuses and communication apparatuses, and obtains game data and the like from another game apparatus by using the communication means in the process in which a game program is executed by a CPU, thereby playing a communicative game.
However, in order to play a communicative game between a plurality of game apparatuses, a game program for the communicative game has to be prepared for each game apparatus.
Therefore, techniques disclosed in Japanese Patent Nos. 3679111, 3699471, 3790257, 3790261, 3790263, 3790264, 4456611, 3874785, and 4324487 (Patent Documents 1 to 9) have been proposed, in which, even when a game program is not prepared, a communicative game can be played by receiving a game program from another game apparatus. Specifically, a game apparatus that does not have a game program downloads the game program from another game apparatus that has the game program, and executes the game program, thereby executing a communicative game based on the game program downloaded from the other game apparatus.
However, in Patent Documents 1 to 9, the game program received from the other game apparatus is expanded on a volatile working RAM, and executed. Thus, when the game apparatus is powered off, the received game program disappears due to the characteristics of the RAM. Therefore, each time the user starts the communicative game, the user needs to perform a transmission/reception operation. As a result, a burden is imposed on the user, and there is inconvenience that the user cannot immediately start the communicative game.